Global IFI – Foroige, The Power of Our Youth…

Foroige, one of Ireland’s top NGO’s, are on target to bring many of their most respected Youth Development Programmes, to developing nations. Their goal is to be under contract in a host of developing nations within three years.

As part of their plan, they will be attending the forthcoming ConsultingIreland’s International Opportunities Conference on the 23rd and 24th September in City West, Dublin.

We talked to Foroige’s Business Development Manager, Maria Doherty about their journey to getting international contracts.

“Two years ago we were given a contract in the Middle East. It was in the space of Creativity and Innovation In the Entrepreneurship. Although a once off, it was a real success and gave us a glimpse of the huge opportunities available internationally”

 Maria Doherty 

Since that time they have been actively pursuing contracts in the IFI (International Funding Institution) space. They became a client of Enterprise Ireland, they participated on a trade mission in the Middle East and they completed ConsultingIreland’s Training course.

“Its not all about money. We have been applying expertise with the youth for more than 60 years. We want other countries to adopt the skills that we have acquired.’ Says Maria.

Foroige will be one of many attendees at the Consulting Ireland Conference next month:

“We are going because we want to build our knowledge on how the system works. We are also hoping to meet a partner who is in the same space”

 Maria Doherty 

Partnering, particularly with other nations is thought to be the best way to break into this enormous market. The organisers will be bringing potential partners from a range of countries as well as representatives from International Funding Agencies. The hope is that it will lead to many new opportunities for Irish Organisations and Businesses.

Foroige, promises to lead the way for other Irish NGO’s looking to this space. As Maria points out, “there is so much expertise in Ireland and we don’t realize that we undersell ourselves. There is a huge amount of expertise that we could sell to the developing world, the question is how to do that and how to get support to do that.”

For information about Global IFI, please navigate to the official conference website, which can be found at: http://www.globalifi.org.

If you wish to exhibit at Global IFI, HelpUsTrade will be your first point of contact regarding your exhibition and sponsorship goals. For more information about the exhibition please CLICK HERE. We can be contacted by email at events@helpustrade.com or by phone on +44 (0) 7718 337 552.